Top 10 Critic Reactions to Netflix's The Irishman

Whenever Martin Scorsese is attached to a picture, you can expect it to be in the Oscar conversation. As surprising as it might sound, Scorsese has actually only won one Academy Award for “The Departed,” which is also his only film to win Best Picture. Reviews seem to indicate that the Academy might correct this with “The Irishman.” Owen Gleiberman of Variety wrote, “‘The Irishman’ has now all but guaranteed Netflix a central place at the awards table, in the same way that ‘Roma’ did last year.” While “Roma” was Netflix’s biggest Oscar winner to date, one award it couldn’t achieve was Best Picture. Of course, if there’s one filmmaker who can finally bring the streaming service Hollywood’s most prestigious prize, it’s Mr. Scorsese.

Sometimes when you read a book, you can immediately envision who should direct the film adaptation. For anyone who picked up the memoir, “I Heard You Paint Houses,” Martin Scorsese was likely the first name that came to mind. As it turns out, these two go together about as well as one would hope. Throw in screenwriter Steven Zaillian, who previously adapted “Schindler's List,” and you have an unbeatable formula. “‘The Irishman” features an ideal match of filmmaker and source material,” IndieWire’s Eric Kohn hailed in his review. Kohn proceeded to say that this “faithful adaptation” “provides a definitive template for Scorsese’s best kind of character study.” Frank Sheernan certainly wouldn’t feel out of place sitting around the table with Henry Hill and Tommy DeVito.

Between “Avengers: Endgame” and “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” we’ve seen some pretty lengthy movies in 2019. “The Irishman” takes the cake, however, clocking in at a reported 209 minutes. While no critic would deny that the film is long, the final result is ultimately rewarding. Vulture’s David Edelstein felt the film “doesn’t fully earn its epic running time. But it’s overlong, it’s not over-scaled.” Johnny Oleksinski of New York Post suggested that his readers “chug a 5-hour Energy, because the terrific ‘Irishman’ deserves your full, un-fatigued attention.” The question is whether a film of this scale and length will be more susceptible to audiences in a theater or from the comfort of home? Owen Gleiberman thinks that might be the movie’s biggest “problem.”

At almost three and a half hours, “The Irishman” did leave a few critics restless at times. Even if the film isn’t without its slower moments, critics are definitely glad that they stayed put for the final act where Frank Sheeran’s character arc comes full circle. “It’s only as the film enters its final devastating chapters that the full weight of Frank’s actions begin to register as something more than names on a coroner’s sheet,” wrote Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly. Stephanie Zacharek shared a similar sentiment, saying, “The final 30 minutes of the movie show what happens when he does—and even then, whatever reckoning he does is happening deep behind his eyes, and his gaze holds us.”

One of the most talked about aspects of the film is the digital de-aging technology used to knock a few decades off Robert De Niro and company. The Wrap’s Alonso Duralde was quite taken with the de-aging, calling it “beautifully-rendered” and “nearly flawless.” David Rooney of The Hollywood Reporter was a little less quick to praise the effect, writing, “It’s distracting only on initial impact, and for the most part easy enough to accept De Niro, Pacino and Pesci playing characters 20 or 30 years younger than them.” While it also took A.O. Scott of The New York Times a while to get used to the effect, he ultimately felt “it doesn’t take you out of the picture any more than makeup or prosthetics might.”

While a majority of the reviews have compared “The Irishman” to Scorsese’s past works, a few have drawn parallels to another A-list filmmaker: Clint Eastwood. The A.V. Club’s A.A. Dowd wrote, “‘The Irishman’ reminded me a bit of ‘Unforgiven’: It feels, at last, like a critical eulogy for an era of crime fiction that Scorsese and De Niro and Pacino built, apart and sometimes together.” Likewise, Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com called the film’s final act “an immersion into a now-old man’s life, fuller than we’re used to seeing in any American movie not directed by Clint Eastwood.” With that in mind, “The Irishman” could make for a strong double feature with Eastwood’s latest movie, “Richard Jewell.”

Joe Pesci was among the most prominent character actors in the business throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s. Since the beginning of the 21st century, though, he’s only appeared in two live-action films: “The Good Shepherd” and “Love Ranch,” the latter of which came out in 2010. We’ve been eager to see this acting powerhouse make a comeback and “The Irishman” sees Pesci return in a big way. His role in this Scorsese collaboration isn’t just a retread of the hot-headed characters we’ve seen him previously play, however. The Guardian’s Benjamin Lee found Pesci’s performance to be a breath of fresh, writing, “He’s rational and professional, much like the film’s plot, which eschews the brash debauchery of ‘Goodfellas’ or ‘Casino’ for something far more grounded.”

From “Taxi Driver” to “Raging Bull,” you can never go wrong when Scorsese and Robert De Niro team up. With exception to a short film entitled “The Audition,” though, we haven’t seen Scorsese direct De Niro in a project since “Casino” in 1995. Since then, De Niro’s kept busy doing comedies like “Dirty Grandpa.” “The Irishman” not only reunites this actor and director, but also sees a return to form for De Niro. Stephanie Zacharek proclaimed, “De Niro gives his best performance in years, with zero mugging or scowling—his Frank is a man of action who’s so busy doing bad stuff, he barely has time to think.” De Niro could very well be looking at his first Best Actor Oscar nomination since “Cape Fear.”

Al Pacino is another phenomenal actor whose career has gone through some turbulence in recent years. 2019 is inclined to go down as a comeback year for Pacino with his supporting role in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” and especially his turn as Jimmy Hoffa in “The Irishman.” Salon’s Gary M. Kramer is one of the many critics who have singled him out as a Best Supporting Actor favorite, saying, “he is also absolutely pitch-perfect, stealing every scene and giving arguably the film’s best performance — he's a shoo-in for an Oscar nomination, if not the award itself.” Believe it or not, this would only be the second Oscar for Pacino. Even more unbelievable, this is the first collaboration between Pacino and Scorsese.

“The Irishman” is like a showcase for several legendary talents at the top of their game. As incredible as De Niro, Pacino, and Pesci are, the real star of the film is Scorsese’s direction. Exactly how does this crime epic stack up against the rest of his filmography, though? As far as Eric Kohn is concerned, ‘“The Irishman’ is Martin Scorsese’s best crime movie since ‘Goodfellas,’ and a pure, unbridled illustration of what has made his filmmaking voice so distinctive for nearly 50 years.” Screen International’s Stephen Whitty called the film “vintage Scorsese, with an often sinuously moving camera, occasional break-the-fourth-wall monologues, wicked wise-guy humour, and explosions of sudden tenderness and casual violence.” Even in his 70s, Scorsese is churning out masterpieces.